Adrian Morley: My Brother Lied To Play For Wales

By STEVE MASCORDENGLAND star Adrian Morley has sensationally admitted his brother Chris lied about his background in order to make 13 appearances for Wales.
In a cautionary tale ahead of next year’s World Cup, Adrian says in his newly-released biography, Moz, that Chris did not qualify to play for the principality on any basis and instead got into the team by speaking “fluent bullshit”.
Adrian Morley writes: “Mike Gregory, the assistant coach at St Helens, was also the Wales assistant. One day, when he was leaving training at Saints, he (Gregory) just so happened to mention he was heading to train the Wales team.
“‘I’m Welsh,’ Chris told him. ‘Well, my gran is… I’m not sure if that counts or not.’
“It counted.
“He travelled down with Greg to the training base, where he was asked more about his Welsh ancestry. And so Chris told them that she lived in a little village, just outside of Swansea which – even after all these years – he still couldn’t pronounce. Aber-something-or-other. Our gran hardly spoke a word of English, he told them, and she loved Wales more than anything.
“None of which was true, of course. My gran didn’t really speak fluent Welsh, but fortunately for Chris he spoke fluent bullshit. His little white lie proved his passport into the Wales team and, to make it even sweeter, it activated a clause in his St Helens contract which gave him a payment of a few grand for playing international rugby!
“I remember him phoning me up.
“‘Aje, if anyone asks you, our gran is Welsh,’ he said.
“‘I thought she was from St Helens.’
“‘Not any more.’”
In 2006, New Zealand’s Nathan Fien was kicked out of the Tri-Nations and his team stripped of two competition points when it emerged that his great grandmother – and not his grandmother – was a Kiwi. He has since qualified for New Zealand on residency grounds.
Morley’s story is likely to serve as a warning to organisers of next year’s World Cup, which will include 14 teams including dozens of players whose qualifications are by ancestry.